The Vitals

My name is Kristin. I live with my husband (A.), three young sons (Cubby, Charlie, and Jack), one infant daughter (Poppy), and old collie dog (Mia) less than a mile from the Canadian border in the far northern woods of upstate New York. Once upon a time I was going country. Now I'm gone.

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Friday, August 21, 2015

Jack had his eight-month birthday this past Tuesday. I may have made more than one joke about the giant, non-crawling, toothless infant.

It was funny because he's the size of a toddler--like, literally the size of a year-and-a-half-old walking child we encountered the other day--but distinctly baby in his lack of other development.

He must have taken the jokes to heart, because he decided to do something about it this week. Specifically, the very edge of his first tooth poked through yesterday, the same day he finally got up on his hands and knees and started rocking in that soon-to-be-crawling kind of way.

He is also starting to drink water from a cup and try very hard to pick up small pieces of bread and egg and so on from his tray. Although that last one mostly devolves into examining the small pieces closely before smashing them cruelly in his giant fists, a la Lennie in Of Mice and Men.
He's trying, though. He's growing, and progressing, and getting less baby every day.

I will savor the Beet Face as long as I can, because I will miss it when he's too old to decorate his face with pureed beets that look hilariously like smeared lipstick.

Thursday, August 20, 2015

Some of you may remember that when Charlie was born three years ago, A. purchased a window-unit air conditioner to put upstairs in our house. It was the first-ever cooling device at Blackrock, and there was no small amount of guilt about putting it in. The indulgence! The energy waste!

The bliss.

We have discovered that this particular energy-smart unit is enough to cool all the bedrooms we sleep in upstairs, as well as the parlor downstairs. Thanks to the many, many doors in our home, we can control where the cool air goes quite easily. This means that not only can we sleep now when the weather is unbearable, but I have a refuge during the day. When it's really hot, I leave the air conditioner on (on a higher temperature setting) so we can go into the parlor to play or read in relative comfort.

Having that one room downstairs to escape to when I've spent the rest of the day cooking and sweating, or doing laundry and sweating, or chasing children and sweating, or just sweating and sweating and sweating some more, is an immeasurable relief. I would even go so far as to say it makes me a better person.

Plus, the air conditioner actually uses about the same amount of electricity as the numerous fans we used to run in every room to make the house bearable.

If I could beatify my air conditioner, I would. Instead, I'll just give it a hearty thank you. And maybe a hug, because I can get more cold air that way.